


in a lifetime

by loudanimal



Category: Maleficent (Disney Movies)
Genre: Imprisonment, Injury, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Shipwrecks, Strangers to Lovers, you couldnt pay me to get off my bullshit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-01-15 08:38:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21250541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loudanimal/pseuds/loudanimal
Summary: Usually, when people wax poetic about things which only happen once in a lifetime, they mean the good things. Theyhopefor them, since humans are nothing if not optimistic. Meeting your soulmate. Seeing a double rainbow. Dropping your toast and having it land safely jam-side-up.Once in a lifetimeis one of those hallowed phrases, a magic spell uttered right up there withonce upon a timeorand they all lived happily ever afteroryou don't have to come in to work today.To use that sacred label to describe misfortune, then, almost feels like perverting its purpose, but let it be known:once in a lifetimeisn't always a fairytale.





	1. Chapter 1

Usually, when people wax poetic about things which only happen once in a lifetime, they mean the good things. They _hope_ for them, since humans are nothing if not optimistic. Meeting your soulmate. Seeing a double rainbow. Dropping your toast and having it land safely jam-side-up. _Once in a lifetime_ is one of those hallowed phrases, a magic spell uttered right up there with _once upon a time_ or _and they all lived happily ever after_ or _you don't have to come in to work today._

To use that sacred label to describe misfortune, then, almost feels like perverting its purpose, but let it be known: _once in a lifetime_ isn't always a fairytale.

Once upon a time, for the first and only time in _your_ lifetime, calamity struck in the form of a white-hot brand of lightning tearing down the side of your merchant ship in the midst of a storm that had already thrown the crew into pandemonium. 

If someone told you later that what you were experiencing that night was actually a glimpse of hell itself, you'd believe them. Frantic shouting and the horrible crunch-snap of wood giving way to a roiling black ocean as if the waves had grown teeth to destroy and devour, air thick with smoke and screams and the stench of human fear and sweat and piss until you made it onto the deck because not one person knew what to do now—_what do we do—where is the captain—_

The damaged vessel lurches at the will of the sea and you lose your footing and you know exactly where the captain is when you see the faintest glimpse of him toppling overboard into the unforgiving void, right where the lightning has practically peeled away a chunk of the taffrail and left a yawning gap in the port side. The hull is taking on water. The ship is sinking.

You need to get to one of the lifeboats. 

You pick yourself up. Rain has plastered your uniform to you and pelts you as you rise. You get one step into your journey to safety when another person practically bowls into you, cutting through the storm and grabbing fistfuls of your drenched attire. They shout your name and you fight to disentangle yourself.

"What are you—let _go!_"

"There's a blockage down below, practically half the crew is stuck in, you _need_ to help!" They plead, yanking you in the exact opposite direction of where you want to go. Faintly, you surmise that some cargo must have come loose and lodged itself somewhere mighty inconvenient for whoever all was working or sleeping below deck but that is the _furthest_ thing from being your problem. 

"They're already dead, leave me alone!" You spit with more fire than the rain could ever hope to extinguish. 

"Someone has to help! I can't do it alone and most everyone's already left, we _need_ to—"

"What, die out of sheer _fucking_ nobility?" You yell back over the din. "Is that what we need to do?" 

You're not the captain of this ship. You're not going down with it. _What did they say? Most everyone's left?_

You hadn't batted an eye at how the ship didn't appear to have enough lifeboats to support the whole crew back when you were on land. You just needed the job. 

You swear there's ice in your chest, now. 

"We have to do _something!_" They insist. It's hard to tell if they're crying on account of the torrential downpour, but their voice cracks pitifully. 

"We have to stay alive." You argue back, pulling at their arm until another great wave has you both sprawling across the rain-slick deck. 

The last you see of them is the light of another bolt of lightning outlining the shape of their boots. The ship, water-laden as it had become at that point, had started to list dangerously to one side.

You slide uselessly into the cold water the same way that the captain had, whacking your ankle good on the way down, and you're immediately fighting the full force of untold millions of tons of water that wants you so, _so_ dead, in that moment. The waves buck and bully you and you're helpless against them and you can _feel_ yourself losing strength, is the worst thing. It's getting harder to keep your head up. Harder to kick your legs. 

Your salvation comes in the form of a slab of charred wood that nearly takes you out with the force that it collides with your head. You blindly reach out for it through the dark water, wrapping your arms tight around and praying that you'll be able to keep a hold of it for as long as the storm lasts.

Maybe..._maybe_ your only argument against the storm and the sinking ship being a glimpse of hell might be that the forever-long hours you spent afterwards clinging to that sodden wood, splinters digging into your arms and icy water surrounding you, should have been considered a hell in it's own right.

You get no sleep, and time passes you unevenly. The dark of night lasts you a lifetime, it seems. You pray that some other crew members will spy you, or that you might find even one other survivor so you might commiserate, but it feels as though you're alone from the moment you hit the water to the second the sky turns a pale dawn-grey in what feels like a heartbeat of a moment. 

The storm leaves quietly, disdainfully. You're left in a thick fog, adrift and alone. 

"And _alive,_" You tell yourself and the mist in a weary voice, mostly to prove that you can still make noise. You're still here. You churn your numb legs in the water, closing your eyes and letting your cheek rest on your makeshift buoy. You accept your fate. You're in for either a long wait or a slow death. 

This morbid acceptance is part of why you're so startled that you almost let go of the plank when it bumps into something. You raise your head and lift your eyes to see a dark stone ledge that you don't hesitate in reaching out for, clumsily scrabbling for purchase so that you can lift yourself up onto what appears to be..._some_ sort of land. It doesn't matter to you much as you carefully navigate another ledge, shivering as you drag yourself up. Massive and jagged spires of stone that look sword-sharp jut out at threatening angles all along the apparent cliff face that you find yourself perched on. The prospect of continuing your climb is agonizing even just to _think_ about—your ankle is throbbing with persistent pain, your muscles are sore, you're already cold and exausted as is—but you don't see yourself as having very many other options. 

You stop frequently. Your rests are long. Every time, though, you make a little more progress.

The suns beats you to its zenith by the time you reach what appears to be flat, more hospitable land. Hospitable being a word that is used here with utmost generosity to the landscape in question, which happens to be a flat and ugly stretch of grey pebbles and dead bushes a few dozen meters above the greedy, sucking ocean below. The benefit that you find is this: the sun is warm, and the ground is warmer.

You collapse on the pebbles as if you've just been offered a pile if the fattest and most feather-stuffed pillows in the world. You take the nap that you deserve.

The first thing you see upon waking is a pair of wide, inquisitive amber eyes embedded in a strangely angular face peering down at you.

You jolt, digging your heels into the sun-baked ground and kicking to slide yourself away from the stranger—emphasis on _strange_—before you sit up to really get a good look at her.

She's...positively inhuman. Spiraling horns rise up from a head of messy dark hair and those orange animal-eyes continue their staring but what's most jarring to you in that instant is the pair of colorful wings sprouting out of her back and fanned out in alarm at your sudden waking.

You've heard of fairies. Everyone has. You know about the dangerous wilderness they inhabit just like anybody, those _Moors_, but you had never heard of any described wuite like this, save that sorceress who had raised hell a couple years back. You gape at the child in confusion, not sure what to say.

"Um...?"

"I thought you were dead," She informs you matter-of-factly, fidgeting with her hands and looking you over like _you're_ the weird one. You blink.

"Surprise?" You manage. She tips her head and then, as if remembering something, she clears her throat and adjusts her posture,

"I'm Daia and my takeoff was _ten_," She lifts her hands up to show you on her fingers, "Days ago, and my friend Rae hasn't done her's yet 'cause she's a little bit too much younger than me." Daia explains to you, as this is supposed to mean anything at all to you, and that you'll know exactly what 'a little bit too much' is. 

"I see," You say even though don't see at all. You tell Daia your name and she repeats it and then nods her head thoughtfully as you push yourself to your feet. "Well, congratulations. I think."

"What are you?" She prompts, stepping just a little bit closer while you test out how much weight your ankle can take right now. 

"A human." The answer is: not much! You're doomed to hobble for an indeterminate amount of time.

"Nuh-_uh._ You're not even scary." Daia looks at you critically. You consider her with tired eyes, not even sure where to begin with this.

"You're sure about that, huh?" You contemplate flexing to prove your scariness but you're too sore all over. _Hey kid, guess how many people I let die?_ It's meant as a joke to cheer yourself up but it just leaves a taste like wet ash in your mouth. You didn't let anyone die and you'll be damned if you let that absurd notion haunt you, even in the form of private jokes. You sniff. You're fairly certain that you're coming down with something after all that time spent in the cold water. You wiggle your toes and hope nothing's died on you. 

"And you don't have iron, either, and humans always have iron." She continues in a serious voice, following you as you limp off the other way.

"Always?"

"_Always._ That's why we're not allowed to never leave, ever. How come you left?" Daia watches you as you ease yourself onto a flat-topped stone a few paces away with a barely concealed hiss of effort.

"Left the what?" You ask in a ragged voice. Daia clambers up right next to you and she sits cross-legged, still looking at you very closely.

"The cavern. Is it 'cause you don't have any horns or wings? I know a boy, he's my clutchmate, and he doesn't have any horns and Udo says he's just a _late bloomer_. He just has little bumps on his head like I had when I was littler. Do you get picked on? Anan gets picked on 'cause he doesn't have real horns yet, but he has wings. He did his takeoff before me and he almost died but only, then he started flying, and it was okay. I thought he was gonna die. You don't have wings so I think you really would die. Did you ever do your takeoff? Is that why you left, 'cause you couldn't do it?" You wonder how so much voice managed to get packed into such a tiny girl. You've been letting her ramble to her heart's content in hopes that she might talk herself out, but so far, no dice. 

You point outward, where the black waves slosh angrily against the perilous stones and where a thick fog sits heavy in the air beyond that in spite of the heat of the sun. "I came from out there."

"The _sea?_" The thought of it makes her wings fluff up dramatically and her eyes go even wider. You sigh. 

"Yeah, sure, I crawled out of the sea." Well, it's not _really_ a lie. "Say—why are _you_ outside of the, erm, cavern?" You ask her, both to get the subject off of yourself and because now you're genuinely wondering. "Thought you said you couldn't leave."

"Well, _I'm_ brave and I'm the best flier in the clutch and Anan bet I couldn't make it out but I did so," She turns from the sea, standing up on your shared stone and facing the cliffs and cupping her hands around her mouth, "_there!_" Daia yells. 

You rub your forehead. Your head is killing you, your mouth is dry, and sitting down hasn't lessened the throbbing in your leg. Daia quietly settles right back down and she resumes her interested study of you. A tiny, claw-tipped finger reaches out to prod your cheek. 

"You're all soft," She says. "Your cheeks and your ears and your teeth are flat." You realize what she means about your teeth when you make out the itty bitty tiger fangs in her grin. You tongue the comparably smooth tip of your own canines. 

"Is that a bad thing?" You ask, ready to have your self-esteem shredded by a child, but Daia only shrugs politely. You suspect she's got some proper manners hiding under all her chattiness.

"Sometimes people are different. You're just the most different person I've ever seen, but that's okay." Daia dangles her legs off of the rock and kicks them idly and you, lightheaded, wonder how pathetic it'd be to beg this kid for some kind of, _any_ kind of help. Supremely pathetic, no doubt, but you know enough about her to know that she has a community in the area and an aptitude for talk-talk-talking, so she'll tell someone about you sooner or later.

_Then_ it hits you that maybe...just maybe, you don't want them to know about you. Daia might not believe you to be a human, but Daia is also just a child, and if this race of people believes humans to be a threat, then...

Then you probably don't want her telling _anybody_ about you. Not sooner, nor later, nor ever. Not until you have a better plan of escape that constitutes more than 'hang out with strange fairy kid', anyway. 

"Daia," You begin nonchalantly. She perks up. "When did you plan on going back?"

"Uhh...I'unno! My wings hurt a lot and I cut my hands up 'cause I climbed a bunch of the way." She shows you her scraped palms and you show her how you match, in return. 

"So, do you think that...maybe anybody might come looking for you, or..." You continue, trying to gauge how much time you have to talk this kid into a vow of secrecy and almost maybe sneaking you some food.

Much to your alarm, Daia's eyes get even bigger as if she hadn't considered anybody coming after her until you mentioned it. "Oh, he's gonna be _upset!_"

_Well in that case, fuck it, right?_ You snort. _Upset._ No wonder this little squirt's out here breaking some kind of big rule, if all she has to fear is the consequence of making somebody _upset_, but Daia's really acting as if this is a big deal. She's scampering away from you now, getting air from the occasional beat of her wings. 

"Bye!" She hollers over her shoulder, disappearing beyond the grey stones. You're on your own again so fast that you can't help but wonder whether you'd imagined the whole scenario. Maybe you're just going mad, but one thing's for certain, and it's that you hadn't been able to talk her into keeping you a secret, and now you're in danger of being discovered by strange looking people who will probably hate you instantly.

You slide off of your rock with a resigned groan, suddenly finding yourself in the market for a hiding place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> >:3


	2. Chapter 2

You find refuge in a narrow gap beneath the broad body of a boulder that you hastily widen by scooping aside fistfuls of gravel until you can wriggle yourself in. The pressure of the act has stabbing pain crawling upwards through your leg from your ankle but your own paranoia keeps you seated in darkness with stones pressing into skin through your mostly-dry attire. Hunger is an angry pit rotting in your belly and fear gives it teeth with which to _chew_ and you lay there, gnawed by your own body and mind, hoping and praying to whatever god willed you to survive this long, if any, that your life won't end on some strange, terrible island at the hands of strange, terrible people. 

At some point amidst all of your melodrama, you fall asleep again.

Your rest is _not_ restful.

In sleep, you find the dark deck of that ship, slick under a sheet of rainwater and unsteady beneath your feet. You have to move forward somehow, you know this. You need to keep moving or you'll die, only there are no waves that beat against the sides of this vessel—just a sea of clammy, grasping hands that shine harsh and unnatural beneath the flashes of lightning that burn through the sky. Palms beat at the hull and nails scrape and break on the wood, leaving behind smears of blood that get swept away by the downpour. You break into a sprint, determined to reach whatever point in the distance is meant to be your salvation, but the deck stretches forward into a smothering darkness as you run, a quiet taunt. Something that knows better inside of you, some small voice, says that you're not going to make it to safety. There is nothing waiting for you at the other end because there will be no end to reach.

But given the choice to die running or standing perfectly still, you'll run each time, so you do. And despite your efforts, those hands manage to reach closer, and the entire ship lists to one side, and suddenly you've lost your footing and you're being dragged and they're _everywhere_ and they're _hurting_ you and—

And then you're awake. 

The inner angles of your little hiding-cranny are managing to dig into every tender spot on your body and the hunger that sang you to sleep is still there, eating at you from the inside. You raise your head and find grit and pebbles stuck to your cheek. 

This fucking _blows_.

It's with an ache that feels deeper than bone that you start to move, slowly but surely, to leave your hole. You're not sure where you're headed, if there's even anywhere _to_ be headed. You're in hostile territory with a bad ankle and an empty stomach. Where do you really think you're going in such a hurry?

You smother those thoughts. That's all a bridge that you'll just have to figure out how to cross when you get to it, and right now all you have to worry about is getting—

_What's that noise?_

You go tense and completely still. 

There's this indescribable whooshing, and then the impact of one—two—three—_four..._

You lose count, but something is landing, and moving on the loose grit and pebbles, and they're talking among each other in voices too low to follow. You hastily start to squirm back into your refuge, shifting stone and dirt and hissing at the pain that makes itself known in your leg again. The dull throb is consistently, and quick to spike at the slightest provocation. You could swear that resting has only worsened it.

You have no idea if you retreated in time. All you know is that you're tucked right back into your hole again, and the steps and low voices are moving closer, and your heart drops into your stomach when a foot drops from the boulder overhead onto the earth just inches from where you're crammed.

You hold your breath. You go still. You hope to anything out there that knows of your plight that your heartbeat isn't as loud as it feels like it is, because it _feels_ like a heavy drum in your chest, in your ears. 

"Wait."

You don't recognize the voice, of course. The fantasy where you do, where these are your crewmates here to collect you, is something even less tangible than your nightmare. Whoever it is sounds mean, but that might just be your rising anxiety talking. What's more significant is that nobody says anything after that. You watch carefully, trying to discern anything about the situation just from a stranger's feet and the shadows of their bodies stretched long by a setting sun. Something's already massively different. _Wings? Are those wings?_

Your mouth feels dry, and those feet shift. Towards you. You're now highly aware of the drag marks you've left in the gravel. Now, you're not some hotshot tracker, but if _you'd_ been told to guess where someone might be hiding...

You shut your eyes tight and will these strangers away. _Somewhere else. Look somewhere else. Go somewhere. Be somewhere else. Please—_

Youmust really be all out of cosmic luck, because hands are grabbing at you and dragging you out into the open before you can finish that thought. You're dropped with just enough time and strength to push yourself upright. No matter what, you're not enduring what happens next face down. 

"There you are." There's a pause. "_Human._ How did you get here? What do you want?"

You don't expect it to sound so...apprehensive. _Afraid_, almost. But you're not given enough time to ponder what that might mean because the group is drawing closer around you. You can't find it in you to look them in the eyes, but you can see a variety of different feathers, just by their edges, but still. Sandy brown, vibrant green. You know you probably ought to be curious, but you're just too tired and too focused on not bursting into ugly sobs.

You crouch as if, by making yourself small enough, you might disappear into the bed of pebbles beneath you. You don't want to do this. You're tired, and hungry, your body and your heart both hurt, you've slept some but not enough, and now this flock of strangers is forcing you to speak and you can't just _shut down_ because they're armed, they could kill you if you don't give them a reason not to, but you feel like you have a mouth full of sand and you just don't know what to say, what they want to hear, what will save your life.

"_Speak._ What do you want? Where did you come from?"

It's a different voice, and this time there is no fear, only barely-restrained ire. Small stones dig into your knees, the fabric of your trousers doing little to soften their points. By now you're really trying to talk because it's looking like your options are speak or die but suddenly you're finding it impossible to catch your breath. This is awful and it's unfair and you hate it. You survived the catastrophe of a lifetime and now it looks like you're just going to die, anyway. _What was the point of this?_

"_Hey!_" A small, familiar voice cuts in, and there's a noise like a flock of city birds rising from an empty street and a swift stomping of little feet. You can hear Daia sprint, pattering to a stop behind one of the soldiers with her wings outstretched, feathers a mess. "You said you would help! I only told you 'cause you said you would help!" She sounds absolutely outraged, like she wants to stick those tiger teeth into someone's arm. _Good for her,_ you think weakly, too drained to muster any ounce of embarrassment at the prospect of having to be saved by such a small child. You can't even force yourself to feel annoyed that she went and told somebody you were up here. You just stare downward with glazed eyes, searching for wherever your voice went. 

The cluster around you breaks. Daia has someone by the wrist and she's tugging. 

"We'll handle this. Get back to your clutch!" Someone demands.

"Stop being mean!" Daia demands right back. In a better mood, you'd laugh, but right now you're just weighing the possibility of escaping from this. If you bolted to the edge, and if you fell and didn't hit anything on the way down, and if the sea wasn't as cold this time, and if you...if...

_No._ There's no way you could just swim back to where you came from. That was delirium talking. _Damn, at least something's talking._ You screw your eyes shut and focus and then nothing happens. You wait. You think about what you need to say, and that you need to say it. You _need_ to. 

"Ship wrecked." You manage. You don't recognize your own voice. "Nn...nobody else is...I think, nobody...nobody..." _Nobody._ You envision the captain skating down dark, wet wood into the angry sea. The cries of a trapped crew. Your head hurts, but that's only one of many parts of you that ache right now. "I won't...I can't. S'just me." You're trying your damnedest to explain that you couldn't hurt them if you wanted to and you've got no backup or cohorts to speak of that might do it for you, but you're tired and you're only _just_ figuring out how to breathe again. Everything feels far away, but no less dangerous. 

The strangers exchange looks above your head and there is much talk that follows your stammered explanation that you're nearly too tired to follow. 

"Should just kill it here and toss it back into the water," suggests the angriest voice.

"No. It hasn't done any wrong, has it? Not _really_. What if others come looking?" It's the timid voice this time. You appreciate the sentiment, but you doubt anybody _would_ come searching. 

"We're hidden. How did it get here when we're _hidden?_ Has the magic started to wane?" A new voice joins in, and more follow, each arguing different pros and cons of killing you or bringing you in alive. From what you can gather, they're all fairly divided, and it quickly becomes such a hot topic of debate that the tight formation around you crumbles completely. Daia siezes her opportunity, shooting to your side with her wings outstretched like a little shield.

"You'll _help._" She commands fiercely.

One of the older ones, a soldier with vibrant wings like her own, purses his lips. You're looking at his face, now, and how it is sharp and strange like all of them. You're all out of words and nearly all out of breath.

"Daia, it is a _human._ Come away, it's not safe. Weren't you supposed to stay with Udo?"

Hearing that you're human makes her shrink a little, and you catch a tense, wide-eyed look that she throws over her shoulder at you. You feel sick when you recall what she told you of humans. _Seems I've lost my only true supporter,_ you think, feeling both resigned and foolish for, again, relying so much on a _child_.

"Well...well _so?_" Daia looks back and her ferocity resumes. "I'll only go back if I can bring them with, okay? I found them so it's fair, and _you're_ not helping." She accused.

The others are quiet for a moment, casting quick looks between themselves. You have no doubt in your mind that any one of these people could simply pick Daia up and carry her out of the way, but something tells you that she's planted an idea in their heads that appeals to all of them, regardless of where they stand on the moral quandary of what to do with you. 

Let you be somebody else's problem.

"We'll pry it for information when it's more lucid," one soldier offers the group. "'Til then, there's plenty of cells to keep it. Not like it could fly away, right?"

"And food?" Daia chimes in, still planted between you and them. A different soldier shrugs, ruffling her deep brown feathers.

"Ask Udo about it."

You don't know who this new person is that they're bringing up besides recognizing it from your talk with Daia hours ago, but you know when you've just been pawned off onto somebody else. Bless Daia's heart, but whatever adult was apparently in charge of her just got one hell of a new reaponsibility. At least, until whoever was _really_ in charge around here came to collect. 

"Well, get up." It takes you a minute to realize they're talking to you. _Buddy, I couldn't get up if I tried._ You grunt unintelligibly in response and hope that they can interpret your noise because it's about as eloquent as you'll be for a while to come. 

More hands come, again, to pull you to your feet. You're reminded, unpleasantly, of the nightmare. Now, you don't believe in exposing children to any degree of unnecessary horror, and that's why you don't pool the last of your strength to start swinging, to give one good last fight before you're hauled off to whatever fate's been decided for you. They would no doubt pulverize you on the spot and some of them sound like they're just _waiting_ for you to give them that reason, and Daia doesn't deserve to carry a memory like that with her. Not when all she was trying to do was help.

You're about as limp as a strawman while they haul you over the dark rocks, dragging you off to somewhere unknown.


End file.
